Tag Archives: illicit

Illicit drug trading in the physical world has represented the subject of many research studies and is very well documented in academic literature. However, individuals involved in illicit drug trading have recently adopted innovative technologies to boost their profits and evade being caught by law enforcement agencies. Darknet marketplaces have been increasingly transforming the drug trafficking business during the past ... Read More »

Recently, illicitly produced fentanyl, and fentanyl analogues, have been rapidly emerging in countries all over the world. Fentanyl is usually disguised as heroin or prescription pills, which results in increased overdose mortality. This phenomenon can be explained by reduced expenses and risk to heroin sellers, heroin shortages, buyer preferences for rapid acting, strong opioids, and the increased popularity of darknet ... Read More »

New Zealand is seen as a remunerative market since purchasers are always been willing to pay higher prices for their illegal drugs. This is naturally engaging the interplay of the price mechanism, forcing the price of such drugs to rise in the country. Since suppliers are always willing to supply more at a higher price, the drug inflow through the ... Read More »

The global drug market is estimated to account for approximately $321 billion per year. Conventionally, illicit drugs used to travel along complex and long supply chains. Nevertheless, the advent of novel darknet marketplaces has started to alter this landscape. Cryptomarkets, or darknet marketplaces, are pillared on anonymizing cryptography and virtual currencies, such as bitcoin, to facilitate illicit transactions between vendors ... Read More »

Cryptomarkets are special forms of online marketplaces that are hosted on the deep web, and feature a large number of vendors. Buyers and vendors on cryptomarkets enjoy the anonymity provided to them by the deep web, as their web locations are concealed and cryptocurrency payments render it almost impossible to track them. Drug trading on various cryptomarkets has recently evolved ... Read More »

Australian law enforcement agencies and authorities have started to crackdown dark web marketplaces selling and distributing exotic animals throughout the country. Since early 2017, Australian airport security officials and investigators from the Department of Environment have been actively investigating into animal trafficking and smuggling. Dark web-based marketplaces and animal traffickers have started to traffic exotic animals such as rare species ... Read More »

The Global Drug Survey and its lead researcher Monica Barratt have found that highly educated young users have been leading illicit dark web narcotics trade over the past year. According to the findings of the Global Drug Survey, users of dark web that order illicit drugs and narcotics using darknet marketplaces are likely to be male, young and recipients of ... Read More »

The US federal government and its law enforcement agencies are focusing on the crackdown on illicit drug trading which occurs on the dark web on a daily basis. Investigators have become increasing concerned over the engagement of young adults and teenagers in illicit dark web drug trading and how easy it is to obtain illegal products and services on darknet ... Read More »

The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) recently published a study about the trends and developments of illegal substances in the European Union. According to the research, one in 4 EU citizen have already tried drugs. The European drug market is already one of the biggest in the world, however, the demand for illegal substances is growing ... Read More »